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Shopping Centers Today -> December 2003
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MARKET THOSE CENTERS, EURO LANDLORDS ADVISED
BY NICKY GODDING
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LISBON, Portugal — Negotiating corporate sponsorships with major brands is important to boosting shopping center income, a speaker told attendees of ICSC’s first European Marketing Seminar, held here in September. But the speaker, Rainier Becker, a managing director at Partner Marketing Cooperation, Germany, cautioned his hearers to pick their partners carefully.
“The most important thing is that shopping centers should control and maintain the quality of their brand,” Becker told more than 100 delegates from 17 countries attending the one-day event at Lisbon shopping center Centro Colombo.
The delegates were also advised to remember that an aging population across much of Europe means spending on such areas as health will rise sharply — at the expense of fashion and other discretionary spending. They were urged to invest in understanding their customer base and then use that knowledge to better target their marketing campaigns.
This is just one of many challenges the shopping center industry needs to confront through marketing, speakers said.
“Shopping centers have increased competition from multichannel retailing as well as a more discerning customer,” said Eileen Connolly, director of retail marketing at U.K. real estate consulting firm Donaldsons. “Centers need to focus on income generation, creative issues, the need to provide return on investment and sales and profitability.”
Robin Bevan, a director at Management Horizons Europe, London, called for more “wow” in shopping centers.
“Successful events and promotions can have a sustained effect on performance, statistically between 5 percent and 15 percent,” Bevan said. “Sixty-five to 70 percent of all store purchases are as a result of stimulation at store level.”
The role of shopping centers is to offer visitors more than merchandise, observed Jeff Klein of Klein O’Rorke, a British brand-communication and design company that worked on the renowned Bluewater shopping center outside London. “People want to visit a place they can relate to,” he said. “It’s no longer just about the shops, but about emotions.”
Mall marketing is an important issue to investors, said Kathleen M. Nelson, managing director of the $40 billion mortgage and real estate portfolio of TIAA-CREF, a New York City-based financial services firm.
“For investors considering investment opportunities in Europe, marketing matters,” said Nelson, who is serving as ICSC chairman for 2003-4. “If they understand the marketing strategy a center’s management has put in place and can assess the effectiveness of the marketing team, it makes a difference to what they are willing to pay.”
ICSC Europe plans to hold a second marketing seminar next year, said the division’s London-based managing director, Ermine Evans.
“It’s obvious that there is a lot of creative thinking going on across Europe,” Evans said. “This seminar has given all delegates and, I might say, our expert speakers, a lot of critical marketing and segmentation information which they intend to use in developing their shopping center brands.”
Future ICSC Europe seminars include one on design and construction to take place in Stuttgart, Germany, on Feb. 8.
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